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State-Sponsored Malware

State-Sponsored Malware

Malware, short for “malicious software,” is software that is used to disrupt computer operation, gather sensitive information, or gain access to private computer systems. The vast majority of malware is criminal, aimed at obtaining banking information or login credentials for email or social media accounts. But malware is also used by state actors. State intelligence agencies use malware to carry out covert actions against other states’ computer systems, such as Flame and Stuxnet. States and state-supporting actors also use malware to spy on activists, journalists, and dissidents.

Since March 2012, EFF has been collecting and analyzing malware deployed by pro-Syrian-government hackers that targets supporters of the Syrian opposition, covertly installs surveillance tools on their computers, and collects keystrokes, passwords, and screenshots. Our analysis has identified two distinct groups that have carried out prolonged phishing and malware campaigns using cheap or free Remote Access Tools, such as Black Shades Remote Controller and Dark Comet RAT. To date, EFF has reported on more than a dozen distinct attacks, which we have translated into Arabic in order to alert the Syrian community.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has spent more than two years studying malware campaigns against Syrian dissidents and opposition members. The government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and its supporters are to blame, says the Foundation's global policy analyst Eva Galperin. "They are all being run by a very, very limited...

"If they can't confirm or deny whether any of these countries have been their clients, then they don't really have an oversight process that anyone should trust to prevent their technologies from being used as part of human-rights abuses," said Eva Galperin, an activist with digital-rights advocacy group the Electronic...

“The Ethio­pian government appears to be doing everything it can to spy on members of the diaspora, especially those in contact with opposition groups,” said Nate Cardozo, a staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group based in San Francisco that prepared the suit.

The Vietnamese government’s enthusiasm for censorship is well known, but the country’s sketchy pro-government hackers are targeting even non-Vietnamese people with malicious phishing campaigns. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, recent targets include a U.S.-based blogger who operates a popular dissident website, a British journalist based in Hanoi, a France-based...